But after losing to Walz by a 58-42 margin on Tuesday, the ride is over. And at 68 years of age, the arch-conservative Quist's career campaigning for elected office probably is too.

So how will the two-time gubernatorial candidate, former college professor, and three-term state Representative be remembered? For local political blogger and cartoonist Ken Avidor, there's no question -- Quist will go down as the guy who truly believed that dinosaurs and human beings lived at the same time.

Carlson, asked by Mother Jones' Tim Murphy what he thinks of Quist, said sarcastically that he's a "wonderful, wonderful guy -- one of the great intellectuals of the 21st century." As evidence of his intellectual prowess, consider the online curriculum supplement for K-12 educators put together by Quist. From Mother Jones:

One section asks this leading question: "Did dinosaurs and people live at the same time, and why do so many recently discovered ancient art works accurately picture dinosaurs?" The answer is a resounding "yes." "The only reasonable explanation for the stegosaurus carved in stone on the wall of the Cambodian temple is that the artist had either seen a stegosaur or had seen other art works of a stegosaur," Quist writes. "Either way, people and stegosaurs were living at the same time."
Elsewhere, Quist provides scientific evidence for the existence of dragons, and suggests that the Book of Job be taught as a science lesson: "Today we know beyond a reasonable doubt--Job 41 is a picture-perfect description of SuperCroc."

In commemoration of that doozy -- combined with the fact that Quist's three-decade career in Minnesota politics is probably at an end -- Avidor drew the cartoon at the top of this post of Quist riding into the sunset on a dinosaur.

We don't know what's scarier -- that Quist could make a living teaching young adults while obviously having a deep skepticism of mainstream science, or the fact that this guy was the MNGOP's candidate for a congressional seat here in 2012.

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Quist believes in factually inaccurate things about dinosaurs, but he really is one himself, of the political variety.

He lost at a time when the tea party is in huge disfavor, and when the right is starting to finally reject their far right extremist crazies. It should be more fun than any movie watching that play out in the next two year election cycle.

Quist was the great hope of the MNGOP's evangelical faction, which is in considerable decline currently. They've been inexplicably short on cash for the past year or so, and the Amendment campaign (plus Quist and Bachmann) really drained their funds.
Quist's election was supposed to prove that the evangelicals had their "mojo" back. Instead, they proved that they can't even be competitive any more.
With Bills, Parry, Arwood, Seversen, and Fields all flaming out spectacularly, the Party is probably going to be forced to resurrect a retread like Coleman or Pawlenty to run against Franken. They really have no bench left. Nobody's left for them to throw at Walz.

@green23 I don't see Coleman being willing to go through that again; he doesn't have the incumbent advantage, and Franken is stronger, not weaker than he was last time around.

I don't think TPaw wants to risk a repeat of his Presidential candidate failure. He has more going for him with less effort and probably more money, if not power, than he ever did. TPaw is pretty much a has been for public office, for the foreseeable future.

I think it will come down to Emmer, either against Franken or Dayton next time around...or as a long shot, the unsinkable Michele Bachmann looking to redeem herself by making a step up in prestige after her near win in CD6 and her spectacular failure as a presidential candidate. With the tea party out of favor, she is another has been unless she can do well in a different race. I doubt she could win CD6 next time.

@james.w.kessler@Dog Gone@green23 I'm not so sure. She had a squeaker last time; if she doesn't get the outside MN support she did this time, she's toast. If Graves runs against her again, he is likely to get more support, not less. But most of all, the old crabby conservatives are dying off, and every year, new young voters who do not vote conservative are joining the voting rolls.